Patrick Calvar questioned on Friday 17 December, the democratic dilemma represents the fight against terrorism and emphasized the weakness of the border controls of the European Union.
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Three months after opening on September 8, the historical trial of the 17 November 2015 attacks enters Hibernation for the end of the year holidays. “I think we all need a moment of breathing, noted with about the President of the Paris Special Assize Court, Jean-Louis Perès, taking leave at the end of the debates, Friday 17 December. The hearing will be suspended for a while. I give you an appointment on January 4th. “
One third of the trial is passed. As surprising as it may seem, the accused have still not been questioned on the merits of the file and we have heard them very little, to tell the truth. This first chapter will let the impression of a very (too much) long introduction, before getting into the heart of the subject in September: from January 4, 2022, the accused will have the opportunity to express himself, for the first time, on the facts that are reproached for them. To want to kiss too, to say everything, to understand everything, this “total trial” has sometimes given the feeling of swinging between a symposium on the radicalization and a commission of inquiry on the flaws of the intelligence services.
None of these subjects lacks interest but their exploration, sometimes illuminating, often laborious, has helped to dilute the real object of this trial. This long entry in the field has finally concluded, on Friday, by one of its most political moments: the hearing of the former boss of the Internal Security Branch (DGSI) Patrick Calvar. The last witness of the year took advantage of his passage to the bar to question the thorny dilemma posed by the fight against terrorism to any democratic society: “Do we want more freedom or more security?”
“The threat came from everywhere”
“Any attack is a failure”, immediately admitted the former head of internal intelligence, before drawing up the table of obstacles – legal, humans and techniques – having in his eyes fed this defeat. Human intelligence, first: “No text allows an informant to infiltrate a network without increasing his criminal responsibility if he had to participate in a criminal association,” he regrets. Someone who works for So you take physical risks, but also to meet in prison, it’s a lot … “
Technical information? “We were facing two challenges. The encryption of communications: it is a major problem, which is still not settled and to which the CIA or FBI are also confronted. And the Big Data: with the multiplication of the means of communication , we were flooded with data that we had to sort. “The DGSI, which was then in” an apocalyptic state “because of the number of” targets “to be monitored, had 3,300 employees (police, administrative, analysts or technicians ) to treat this tsunami of information.
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